[North America] NEW SPLATFEST: Team Past Travel vs. Team Future Travel!

[Zombie Aladdin]

We already have an "everyone's a winner" system. I don't know that "everyone's an equal winner for participating" system works very well for competition. That sounds a little like our Cold War conversation, on the other side, actually :D

But great minds think alike! I wrote the above before reading your post! :) I do like the idea of additional fest ranks. I had another idea where EVERY win awards a snail, but then I realized that woudn't fix gaming the system since the strong team would be more likely to win each round (though not always true, I lost a LOT on Team Past. It's not that team future was great, it's just that my team did not paint anything. If I used Aerospray we won a lot. If I used Carbon we won moderately often. If I used eliter we were sunk, even if we held mid and even pushed because our base was not painted. That said most of the Future players I played were NOT awful. Not superhuman Japanese Sploosh amazing, but not awful. I didn't need ninja reflexes just to keep my death count in the single digits like the nightmare S+ TW rounds I get on regular days, but fighting was intense enough to be interesting and addictive. It wasn't "defend the noob" and shoot no one type gameplay.

The thing is that these serious players are voting to get those extra Super Sea Snails--even 1 bonus Super Sea Snail for winning will cause the exact same phenomenon we're seeing. That's why I figured the best alternative is to remove the incentive altogether and make winning Splatfest strictly about bragging rights.

As for bonus Super Sea Snails for continuing to play upon reaching King or Queen, I personally think the points system should continue unchanged (1 point for 200p inked, 2 points for 400p inked, 3 extra points for winning), with one Super Sea Snail given out after the Splatfest for every X points you've earned post-Royalty. This will encourage these serious players to keep playing and attempt to win, but you'll still be progressing towards more Super Sea Snails even when you lose.

By the way, the reason I refer to them as "serious players" is because, well, they're serious about their re-rolls. They might not necessarily be good players, and on the other hand, there are probably at least a few highly skilled players who don't care about re-rolls at all. But what the people who choose Splatfest teams based on which one they think will win have in common is that they want those Super Sea Snails, and that desire overrides any personal preference towards a team. Hence, "serious players."

Yaaay! I actually finally played someone on/related to the boards! That's so Fresh! :) Yep, that was me! The name rings a bell (I try to pay attention when I see a clan tag, they're the ones I have to watch most for! ;)) If I recall correctly she was definitely one of the more "troublesome" squids I fought that day (and I'm pretty certain we lost that round!) It was the Aerospray MG. Inkmines kill all interest in the RG for me. Other than inkstrike I'll never understand RG's popularity (I know, I know, your little inkers...) I'm trying to remember, I see that name and I'm picturing getting splatted in one of the lower sections....I can't remember if it was ours or the enemy bases. I usually hold a defensive position in Piranha, but I think with Aero I was going offensive (because my little suicidal maniacs never make it far enough to effectively paint in a push, and my weapon was most effective for it anyway :p) Some of those rounds on that map I was walking right into enemy territory knowing I'd get splatted because I figured at Aero's fire rate, it'd be worth it for the coverage!

That's pretty neat to hear feedback like that! It can be frustrating in the game to never really know how you're doing. I'm much the same way, I mostly prefer TW (that's the selling point of the game after all!) and get frustrated with the rank scoring, so I rarely play ranked (I'll probably start a lot more soon since I kind of miss the modes!) and play mostly TW.

Thanks, both of you, for noticing/telling me about it! :)

Yeah, the "ZOT" tag is most definitely a clan: The Zot Clan, the official Splatoon clan for students and alumni of the University of California, Irvine. (UCI's mascot is the anteater, and the word "Zot" comes from how an anteater character in the comic strip BC frequently utters it.) It's a pretty skilled clan, all of them better than me at least (they can all pretty consistently beat Japanese players in Turf War), and most of its members chose Team Future, so I guess there you go.

I perfectly understand the Aerospray RG's popularity. It is the perfect weapon for people who want to stay away from the action and strictly ink. Its firing pattern, its fire rate, its sub-weapon, and its special weapon all help with that. (Ink Mines are a bit less obvious than the others--they're great for retreating.)

The reason I stated that her rank is unusually low for her level is because some people seem to assume that such a pattern must mean it's an alt account, or if a player displays an abnormally high skill level for the rank. And I would say that it may just be someone who dislikes Ranked but will play it every now and then. (The reason she dislikes Ranked is mostly due to uncooperative teammates. She likes Splat Zones more than the others because it requires the least amount of cooperation. As she is a splat-based player, she gets splat-oriented teammates, and in Tower Control and Rainmaker, she frequently finds teammates who go wandering off looking for opponents to splat regardless of if they're somewhere important or not, which causes her to lose Tower Control and Rainmaker matches frequently. She also finds glory hounds a lot, people who hide some small distance from the tower or the Rainmaker when her team has control, ready to jump in and try to take the credit for the win.)

I think in Japan it's more open just due to the volume of players, roughly 4x what we have. (1M vs 4M which is why you're 4x more likely to see Japanese players in your lobby.) Even of consensus is "popular team wins" there's enough variety and mix between different mindsets that both teams are much more balanced. Also, the TYPE of players in Japan are different. Here Nintendo is a "kids brand' that parents buy their childeren AND it's "THE" brand for us in the know "vintage" gamers (80s/90s kids) and fans of Japanese games. XBox and PS are where "1337 Gamerez" go. In Japan Nintendo is the brand for "1337 Gamerez" followed very closely by PS, and XBox is that weird thing for Ameriphiles with an odd fettish for sports games and Halo. So a bigger player base of Splatoon is "core gamers" out of the Japanese 4M than the NoA 1M. (Thus the "run, it's the Japanese!" memes in Splatoon - there's more of them, and more of them are skilled gamers.) So even if the "best" go for one team, the "everyone else" team is made of middle of the road players and still has a solid chance at winning rather than assuming everyone on Team B is Cindy Lou Hoo.

That definitely true: With so many Japanese players, there's not going to be a consensus on what team to go for.

That being said, I think the Japanese players, the REALLY good ones, have a fearsome reputation because they prefer to play against each other. Nothing develops skill better and faster than playing against the best all the time. Why do American basketball players stomp all over most other countries' basketball players? Because North America has the NBA (and the WNBA). They're constantly playing against each other, keeping their skills sharp by competing against similarly sharp people. In contrast, the United States' men's soccer team performs averagely in the World Cup and cannot compete with the likes of Brazil or Germany because there isn't some organized national soccer league to the scale or popularity of the NBA, or NHL, or MLB, or NFL, the way most countries in Europe and South America do. The American soccer players don't get to play against other best players quite as much, and the entirety of CONCACAF is seen as something of a joke to Europeans and South Americans.

Hence, I think it's very important to play against other really good players to be really good yourself. I wouldn't be surprised if some of those untouchable Japanese Splatoon players purposely pick the more popular team to get more opportunities to play against each other.

(Playing against each other constantly and honing their skills is how the rather small Japanese Halo and Call of Duty players got so good too, by the way. Despite their massively smaller numbers, Japanese players can consistently outdo even the American best, such that American players coined a new term, "Japwned," after such beatings.)

Europe....wait, they still sell Nintendos in Europe? :p It's just SOOO unpopular. In NoA we at least have that kid thing going on. In Europe it's just unpopular through and through. But it's regional. Most of Europe doesn't care about Nintendo at all, but a few countries like it in percentages similar to Japan. France and Italy are huge Nintendo bastions in Europe, but most other countries...not so much. So I think their player pool is more like Japans in that it's more "core gamers" but only from a handful of countries, but instead of padding the rest with 6 year olds, it's just a whole lot of dead air.

A lot of Nintendo fans in the UK too. All four regions of it. Germany's culture is very sensitive about violence, so Nintendo remains popular there too because of its family-friendly image.

In any case, Nintendo IS actually pretty popular in Europe as a whole. Take a look at Mario Kart 8's loading screens. It will identify the country of every player in the room. More often than not, European players outnumber any other continent. These sessions were from the last time I played Mario Kart 8, which was last month:

With that said, there's one thing that people seem to be dismissing. Voting. This is the root of the current NA trend and it's clear that the "choosing your favorite team" won't take place. I mean, why would those who have seen success with the current system stop doing it? Since this is such an issue, I would recommend a complete overhaul of Splatfest. Ditch voting, ditch themes, and just have people decide whether or not they want to participate. Those who do will automatically be put on one of two teams and let's say the day before it begins, teams are balanced based on Rank (since that's really all we have to go by for skill) and number of players, then the event begins. Teams can't be swayed in anyone's favor since no one will know what team they'll be put on. Wins are all that would count. Popularity would play no role. Some may say "it takes the fun out of it" or "what's the point if you can't vote". I'd say "Would you rather have freedom of choice with potentially imbalanced teams or being forced on a team with (theoretically) more balanced teams?

I would NOT want the voting to be taken away. The entire point of Splatfests, in-universe, is to make decisions, and that destroys the point if no one is able to actually make one. If the game will decide for you, then what will happen if you're put on a team with a theme you dislike? If there won't be themes at all, then that's going to get a lot more boring.

I'll take the situation we have right now over removing voting or themes. I play the Splatfests for the themes.

 

[Zero Meddler]

I would NOT want the voting to be taken away. The entire point of Splatfests, in-universe, is to make decisions, and that destroys the point if no one is able to actually make one. If the game will decide for you, then what will happen if you're put on a team with a theme you dislike? If there won't be themes at all, then that's going to get a lot more boring.

I'll take the situation we have right now over removing voting or themes. I play the Splatfests for the themes.

"Ditch voting, ditch themes, and just have people decide whether or not they want to participate."

Themes wouldn't be an issue in this situation. It would be regulated to team colors which means nothing in the long run since every game you play outside of Splatfest has different ink colors. Some people don't care for themes and play just to get Snails. Besides, the point of this suggestion is to eliminate any potential imbalances between team numbers and "skill". Having themes but not being able to choose would create the situation you describe above, which is why I think it would be better to get rid of themes if people are so determined to fix Splatfest.

 

[MissingNumbers]

"Ditch voting, ditch themes, and just have people decide whether or not they want to participate."

Themes wouldn't be an issue in this situation. It would be regulated to team colors which means nothing in the long run since every game you play outside of Splatfest has different ink colors. Some people don't care for themes and play just to get Snails. Besides, the point of this suggestion is to eliminate any potential imbalances between team numbers and "skill". Having themes but not being able to choose would create the situation you describe above, which is why I think it would be better to get rid of themes if people are so determined to fix Splatfest.

What you're asking for is basically asking to remove Splatfest as a whole, with just a random decision of who gets how many snails.

 

[Zombie Aladdin]

Yeah, I WANT the themes. Again, I'll take the situation we have now if it means I get to keep the themes.

Removing them would just make Splatfests bland, sterile, and dry, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who thinks so.

 

[Zero Meddler]

What you're asking for is basically asking to remove Splatfest as a whole, with just a random decision of who gets how many snails.

No. That's not even close.

With that said, there's one thing that people seem to be dismissing. Voting. This is the root of the current NA trend and it's clear that the "choosing your favorite team" won't take place. I mean, why would those who have seen success with the current system stop doing it? Since this is such an issue, I would recommend a complete overhaul of Splatfest. Ditch voting, ditch themes, and just have people decide whether or not they want to participate. Those who do will automatically be put on one of two teams and let's say the day before it begins, teams are balanced based on Rank (since that's really all we have to go by for skill) and number of players, then the event begins. Teams can't be swayed in anyone's favor since no one will know what team they'll be put on. Wins are all that would count. Popularity would play no role. Some may say "it takes the fun out of it" or "what's the point if you can't vote". I'd say "Would you rather have freedom of choice with potentially imbalanced teams or being forced on a team with (theoretically) more balanced teams?

There are still teams. There are still winners and losers. The winning team still gets more than the losing team. The only thing random is WHICH team you're placed on.

 

[BlackZero]

People will find a way to figure out how a Splatfests are scored, even if it does take a while. It took a few for people to realize that the less popular teams are winning and use that to their advantage, so I don't see why people wouldn't try to figure out how this system of scoring would work if it were implemented. People don't give up THAT easily. This suggestion would only be temporary.

That's the point. It just has to work long enough for people to say "eh, screw it." There are going to be those who figure out how to game the system. The point of this solution is to change things so that the old way doesn't work and the majority of people stop worrying about what team is going to win and just pick a team that appeals to them.

If you ask me, offering an idea to replace one with a critical flaw with another that has a critical flaw makes no sense. Even if it does take a while for people to figure it out, there's still the risk that SOMEONE would and spread that information.

The question isn't whether other solutions have serious flaws (any solution that isn't an overhaul is going to have serious flaws), it's whether or not those changes are going to accomplish what they're supposed to. In this case, I'm not trying to "fix" Splatfest scoring; I'm trying to change the way scoring works to discourage a certain behavior from the players. The flaw is that people miraculously catch on overnight and exploit the new system from day one. In that case, we're no worse off than we are now. This idea has the potential for net gain, but not net loss unless I'm overlooking something.

This time I was talking about your suggestion that would be "rigging the house" by changing which team's win counts for how much of a win based on average skill. The win scores would then not reflect real wins but "wins that should be." I really can't like that idea much, especially since the only way to gauge skill on a team is by the ranks that we've already determined are meaningless.

Ah, my mistake. The scores would reflect real wins as the players have to actually win the match for it to count for them. However, given the skill discrepancy, the scores would be weighted because A match between 4 Cs and 4 As will benefit the As. Are there C ranks who can outperform A ranks? Absolutely, but I suspect these people are the exception and not the rule. This system wouldn't have to factor in every rank, merely delineate between C>B and A>S. That would prevent the game from weighting S rank players who fall into the As after a losing streak, which would only leave people with alts or C Rank prodigies as outliers.

Obviously, this can throw the skill system that's in Splatoon out of whack a bit (which isn't perfect to begin with). But there's also the problem, how WOULD skill be measured? I think if we can answer that question, then we can start really getting some more solid ideas as to how this problem could be solved. In the end it's as Black Zero stated (I'm seeing many more people with "Zero" in their name lately O-O )

If I were designing the skill metrics, I would have game keep aggregate data on several factors: shot accuracy, the amount of time you ride the tower, carry the rainmaker, how close to goal you get with it, the number of times you take the tower/RM to goal vs letting your teammates do it, your average coverage, the number of times you take damage without dying vs dying, how long you stay alive in between deaths, and numerous other things that correlate with a player's level of performance. It would use all that data to build a player skill and gameplay profile. Based on shot accuracy, K/Ds, and coverage the game can determine whether you are aggressive, defensive, or somewhere in between. Based on that, it will weigh different stats based on how they correlate with other players with a similar gameplay style. The computer would then perform a lot of complex calculations to create a 3D bell curve that represents your gameplay trends, and compare that bell curve to several other players to place you within a set range of player values that represents ranks or tiers.

In this type of system, weighted scores could be fine tuned to fill in gaps between the average player skill because the game will have a far more accurate picture of who you are as a player. It wouldn't be a simple matter of going up and down in ranks based on winning and losing streaks. Ranks would be determined by how your stats compared to those of other players. Alt accounts would still be outliers though. I guess you could tether alts to a single gamer profile and encourage multiple users in a single household to register separate profiles to keep their characters separate from your alt accounts. In that case, Splatfests could limit voting and participation to a single character on a person's profile and have their sea snail reward go to the profile where gamers could use it on any of their characters. Not foolproof, but better imo.

 

[PrinceOfKoopas]

I am not saying people are deliberately colluding. I'm saying the end result is similar. I don't honestly think some Splatoon Mafia meet in a speakeasy and plan out the winner. I think the serious players are choosing the side they assume will win based on past trends, which makes it a self-fulfilling prophecy. So you get a "collusion effect" when all the more hardcore players who want snails for improved gear join one team while the other team is filled mostly with people who are more interested in a teams theme or sister (less serious players). This creates a skill discrepancy and places one team at a disadvantage because it has a lower concentration of serious players compared to the team everyone assumes will win. I used the word "collusion" because I couldn't think of a better word for it and didn't want to write out a paragraph explaining it.

I mean, you can't really fix this unless you remove choice like the next guy is trying to do, or have the themes be unpredictable.

With that said, there's one thing that people seem to be dismissing. Voting. This is the root of the current NA trend and it's clear that the "choosing your favorite team" won't take place. I mean, why would those who have seen success with the current system stop doing it? Since this is such an issue, I would recommend a complete overhaul of Splatfest. Ditch voting, ditch themes, and just have people decide whether or not they want to participate. Those who do will automatically be put on one of two teams and let's say the day before it begins, teams are balanced based on Rank (since that's really all we have to go by for skill) and number of players, then the event begins. Teams can't be swayed in anyone's favor since no one will know what team they'll be put on. Wins are all that would count. Popularity would play no role. Some may say "it takes the fun out of it" or "what's the point if you can't vote". I'd say "Would you rather have freedom of choice with potentially imbalanced teams or being forced on a team with (theoretically) more balanced teams?

Of course this system isn't perfect either, I mean for starters...

This would be a total disaster, and yes, I'd rather have freedom of choice with imbalanced teams.
Freedom to pick which team I want to fight for is significantly more important to me than 6 Snails which I kinda hoard anyway.

@BlackZero did a good job of explaining what he meant, but I'd offer this very thread as the example of what he described. The thread is a poll thread. How do you think many chose to use that poll to determine which team they believe will win based on past trend? The thread isn't intentional collusion but this thread is the extent of it on Squidboards in terms of providing information to those who are looking "For the winning team" It's one of the groupthink points of departure (each individual "following the trend")

I mean, I made this thread, and let me tell you that Team Future was winning at some points during it...

On the other hand, other communities have polls too and Team Future won those in a landslide compared to this poll, which was relatively even pre-Splatfest.
29-71 voting https://plus.google.com/u/0/+DottyProductions/posts/DdvjDeEsqK9
31-69 voting https://plus.google.com/u/0/101055840615878666561/posts/EDA3hMAjveT

 

[Zero Meddler]

If I were designing the skill metrics, I would have game keep aggregate data on several factors: shot accuracy, the amount of time you ride the tower, carry the rainmaker, how close to goal you get with it, the number of times you take the tower/RM to goal vs letting your teammates do it, your average coverage, the number of times you take damage without dying vs dying, how long you stay alive in between deaths, and numerous other things that correlate with a player's level of performance. It would use all that data to build a player skill and gameplay profile. Based on shot accuracy, K/Ds, and coverage the game can determine whether you are aggressive, defensive, or somewhere in between. Based on that, it will weigh different stats based on how they correlate with other players with a similar gameplay style. The computer would then perform a lot of complex calculations to create a 3D bell curve that represents your gameplay trends, and compare that bell curve to several other players to place you within a set range of player values that represents ranks or tiers.

In this type of system, weighted scores could be fine tuned to fill in gaps between the average player skill because the game will have a far more accurate picture of who you are as a player. It wouldn't be a simple matter of going up and down in ranks based on winning and losing streaks. Ranks would be determined by how your stats compared to those of other players. Alt accounts would still be outliers though. I guess you could tether alts to a single gamer profile and encourage multiple users in a single household to register separate profiles to keep their characters separate from your alt accounts. In that case, Splatfests could limit voting and participation to a single character on a person's profile and have their sea snail reward go to the profile where gamers could use it on any of their characters. Not foolproof, but better imo.

So rather than weigh the scores based on skill, wouldn't it be better to match those with similar skill in a game? That way, everyone has an equal contribution while having fair games.

This would be a total disaster, and yes, I'd rather have freedom of choice with imbalanced teams.
Freedom to pick which team I want to fight for is significantly more important to me than 6 Snails which I kinda hoard anyway.

Tell me, how would this be a disaster?

 

[PrinceOfKoopas]

Tell me, how would this be a disaster?

Arbitrary teams without themes/without choice would take away the entire fun of Splatfest. Whether it be me writing a great detailed article explaining my choice of teams, or the thousands of people making crappy (though sometimes awesome) Miiverse drawings of the team selections and showing their support, all of that comes from the existence of themes and the ability to select between them.

I don't feel like I'm just playing hours of Turf Wars just for snail. I feel like I'm playing to make the very spirit of Team _____ proud. I'm out there, fighting for my country for naughtiness. Depending on how good the theme is, this can be an important motivator.

 

[Zero Meddler]

Arbitrary teams without themes/without choice would take away the entire fun of Splatfest. Whether it be me writing a great detailed article explaining my choice of teams, or the thousands of people making crappy (though sometimes awesome) Miiverse drawings of the team selections and showing their support, all of that comes from the existence of themes and the ability to select between them.

I don't feel like I'm just playing hours of Turf Wars just for snail. I feel like I'm playing to make the very spirit of Team _____ proud. I'm out there, fighting for my country for naughtiness. Depending on how good the theme is, this can be an important motivator.

So for you, it's more about team spirit and less about functionality? Fair enough. I can see why you would feel that way. I do enjoy the posts people make and the feeling of fighting for my team myself. If were up to me though, I'd get rid of it in order to "fix" the problem of people picking the less popular team in order to maximize winnings. As we have seen, that sucks some of the fun out of it for those who just lose, lose, lose, lose, lose, lose, lose. I mean there are those who win, win, win, but that doesn't mean much come results and the x6 win multiplier.

 

[PrinceOfKoopas]

So for you, it's more about team spirit and less about functionality? Fair enough. I can see why you would feel that way. I do enjoy the posts people make and the feeling of fighting for my team myself. If were up to me though, I'd get rid of it in order to "fix" the problem of people picking the less popular team in order to maximize winnings. As we have seen, that sucks some of the fun out of it for those who just lose, lose, lose, lose, lose, lose, lose. I mean there are those who win, win, win, but that doesn't mean much come results and the x6 win multiplier.

Yeah, I wouldn't get rid of it.

That said, someone HAS to win, and someone HAS to lose. As it stands, Splatoon is already pretty close to "everyone gets a trophy for trying hard" so I really don't think that needs to change.

If you're bad at the game then yeah, you'll lose lose lose. I guess same if your teammate is bad, but as you can see from the Squidboards poll plenty of people voted for Team Future that you're not doomed to an awful team.


If this trend of a "collusion" with popularity was entirely meta-gaming and not team spirit, you would see the popularity numbers be more... consistent. They're not.

Autobots/Nice and Decepticons/Naughty having pretty much the same Popularity scores when everything else goes up and down gives evidence that people are choosing based on thematic reasons. You can't have Team Callie go from 51% to 36% to 28% back to 37% up to 41% in the span of three months and believe that those are consistent numbers.

(And no, the numbers going up at the end aren't skilled players colluding together which would raise Popularity slightly. There aren't that many.)

 

[BlackZero]

I mean, you can't really fix this unless you remove choice like the next guy is trying to do, or have the themes be unpredictable.

That is certainly an option which may end up working out better in terms of balancing teams. Weighted scores can compensate, but it's an imperfect solution. For example, it doesn't factor in the impact that squads have. Do competitive squads make all their players play for the same Splatfest team or do they let each player pick whatever team they want? If you get competitive squads that commit all their players to a single team, that will certainly tip the skill balance in favor of whichever team most squads choose. I play in a casual squad that doesn't really care, so I can't speak for the more hardcore squads. If that is a factor, I'm not sure how well assigned teams would go over if squad mates get put on different teams.

So rather than weigh the scores based on skill, wouldn't it be better to match those with similar skill in a game? That way, everyone has an equal contribution while having fair games.

Not if 30% of Team A consistently perform on an S+ level while only 10% of Team B does. Team A has 20% more high performance players in its pool to put into matches than Team B, hence the need to compensate for this with weighted scores. If it was closer to an even distribution, there wouldn't be a problem and we probably wouldn't be having this discussion. When one team has a higher concentration of serious players, it's a simple numbers game.

If we could guarantee close to an even distribution of competitive/serious players on both teams, there wouldn't be a need for weighted scores. I don't know of any way to do that if you let people pick their teams. So, we can either leave it alone and have predictable results, take away people's ability to choose teams to guarantee both teams are as close to balanced as possible, or use weighted scores to compensate for one team having fewer skilled players. There may be other options, but those are the only ones that come to mind at the moment.

So, it's really a matter of what you can live with. Do you want more competitive Fests and the ability to choose your team? Weighted scores are the way to go. Do you want competitive Fests without giving either team a curve? Assigned teams will do that. Do you want to pick your team and not give either team a curve in case one team gets more skilled players? Then you'd probably be happier with the status quo and predictable results. Personally, I'm fine with giving one team a leg up if they have a lot fewer skilled players compared to the other, but ymmv.

 

[Zero Meddler]

So, it's really a matter of what you can live with. Do you want more competitive Fests and the ability to choose your team? Weighted scores are the way to go. Do you want competitive Fests without giving either team a curve? Assigned teams will do that. Do you want to pick your team and not give either team a curve in case one team gets more skilled players? Then you'd probably be happier with the status quo and predictable results. Personally, I'm fine with giving one team a leg up if they have a lot fewer skilled players compared to the other, but ymmv.

"With that said, there's one thing that people seem to be dismissing. Voting. This is the root of the current NA trend and it's clear that the "choosing your favorite team" won't take place. I mean, why would those who have seen success with the current system stop doing it? Since this is such an issue, I would recommend a complete overhaul of Splatfest. Ditch voting, ditch themes, and just have people decide whether or not they want to participate. Those who do will automatically be put on one of two teams and let's say the day before it begins, teams are balanced based on Rank (since that's really all we have to go by for skill) and number of players, then the event begins. Teams can't be swayed in anyone's favor since no one will know what team they'll be put on. Wins are all that would count. Popularity would play no role. Some may say "it takes the fun out of it" or "what's the point if you can't vote". I'd say "Would you rather have freedom of choice with potentially imbalanced teams or being forced on a team with (theoretically) more balanced teams?"

I think you can see where I'd stand on this matter if you haven't already seen.

 

[PrinceOfKoopas]

That is certainly an option which may end up working out better in terms of balancing teams. Weighted scores can compensate, but it's an imperfect solution. For example, it doesn't factor in the impact that squads have. Do competitive squads make all their players play for the same Splatfest team or do they let each player pick whatever team they want? If you get competitive squads that commit all their players to a single team, that will certainly tip the skill balance in favor of whichever team most squads choose. I play in a casual squad that doesn't really care, so I can't speak for the more hardcore squads. If that is a factor, I'm not sure how well assigned teams would go over if squad mates get put on different teams.

Are hardcore squads really that prevalent that they'd tip the balance of a Splatfest?

I have no idea what squads do since I'm not in one and don't touch that part of Squidboards or anything.
Any squader wanna give insight?

 

[Zero Meddler]

Yeah, I wouldn't get rid of it.

That said, someone HAS to win, and someone HAS to lose. As it stands, Splatoon is already pretty close to "everyone gets a trophy for trying hard" so I really don't think that needs to change.

If you're bad at the game then yeah, you'll lose lose lose. I guess same if your teammate is bad, but as you can see from the Squidboards poll plenty of people voted for Team Future that you're not doomed to an awful team.


If this trend of a "collusion" with popularity was entirely meta-gaming and not team spirit, you would see the popularity numbers be more... consistent. They're not.

Autobots/Nice and Decepticons/Naughty having pretty much the same Popularity scores when everything else goes up and down gives evidence that people are choosing based on thematic reasons. You can't have Team Callie go from 51% to 36% to 28% back to 37% up to 41% in the span of three months and believe that those are consistent numbers.

(And no, the numbers going up at the end aren't skilled players colluding together which would raise Popularity slightly. There aren't that many.)

There's also a skill gap that plays a role in win rate but that's a whole different discussion.

Of course theme has everything to do with popularity. It will NEVER be consistent. I mean, you saw Ninjas vs. Pirates. 72/ 28. The there was Art vs. Science which was a close 51/49. There was a time where "collusion" wasn't much of a thing but as of late, it seems to be the case.

If I had to keep Splatfest relatively the same but change something, all I'd really do is lower the win multiplier to around x3 - x4. If you look at the results when the Fests had that, the results were still pretty close. The biggest gap was between Autobots and Decepticons, but even then it was by 32 points... it's all you really CAN do unless you have some mind control device that forced players to pick what they actually liked. =/

 

[LimitCrown]

It is not an inherent fact that the more popular team will always lose. Have you already forgotten about Japan and Europe? And, well, @Award said it better than I could, but it isn't set in stone that the better players will pick the least popular team. Is it a trend now, yeah, but it's something that could be changed.

Also, I wouldn't call 18 Sea Snails "meaningless."



Sir, please do not put words in my mouth. I don't want such a system, nor do I think anyone else would. Where the hell did you get that idea from?

And if I may pose my own question, would you rather axe the Turf War aspect entirely, and just have it be a voting contest where the most popular team wins?
(I'm only half-joking about this; from your posts as of late, that's the impression that I get.)

Do you think that people will certainly be honest about their actual intentions and that a number of people won't try to game the system by intentionally picking the team with less popularity? From what I can tell, this isn't the case. Also, you continue to point out Japan and Europe's Splatfests as if the ones in which one team has more popularity and wins actually matter in regard to choosing a win rate multiplier. Japan and Europe's Splatfests have their own separate issue that can't be alleviated by changing the multiplier. Why should North America's Splatfests not matter?

The losing team receiving a smaller amount of Super Sea Snails is still an indicator that they lost, and I'm sure that those who care about winning the Splatfests will be tempted to try to choose the team with the greatest chances of winning rather than the team with the theme that they like the most.

You stated that Team A in my example deserved to lose, completely ignoring the scenario that I presented in which the difference between both teams' win rates was actually very insignificant. I claimed that the 6x multiplier in Splatfests made the scoring system inherently broken by putting too much weight on wins and used the popularity difference in the Team Pirates vs Team Ninjas Splatfest as a major example. You stated in response that how large the difference in win rates are shouldn't matter, therefore judging any hypothetical and existing Splatfest results solely by their win rate, which is a terrible way of doing things.

 

[Flareth]

Do you think that people will certainly be honest about their actual intentions and that a number of people won't try to game the system by intentionally picking the team with less popularity? From what I can tell, this isn't the case. Also, you continue to point out Japan and Europe's Splatfests as if the ones in which one team has more popularity and wins actually matter in regard to choosing a win rate multiplier. Japan and Europe's Splatfests have their own separate issue that can't be alleviated by changing the multiplier. Why should North America's Splatfests not matter?

Well, of course people will try to game the system. People are bastards like that, it's in our blood. But that's neither here nor there, because people will do this sort of thing for anything that can be manipulated (which is everything).

Okay, I see we're thinking different things here. I'm not worried about the multiplier, honestly; is it a bit much, perhaps, but that's for another time. I keep raving about the overseas Splatfests for a different reason—that popularity has the opposite "effect" over there that it does over here.

The losing team receiving a smaller amount of Super Sea Snails is still an indicator that they lost, and I'm sure that those who care about winning the Splatfests will be tempted to try to choose the team with the greatest chances of winning rather than the team with the theme that they like the most.

That's me injecting my thoughts into the matter and assuming it's a widespread belief. My bad.

You stated that Team A in my example deserved to lose, completely ignoring the scenario that I presented in which the difference between both teams' win rates was actually very insignificant. I claimed that the 6x multiplier in Splatfests made the scoring system inherently broken by putting too much weight on wins and used the popularity difference in the Team Pirates vs Team Ninjas Splatfest as a major example. You stated in response that any difference in win rates shouldn't matter, therefore judging any hypothetical and existing Splatfest results solely by their win rate, which is a terrible way of doing things.

...right, I get what you're saying on the multiplier front. Still, an advantage is an advantage, no matter how minor. I'm not a fan of this idea of handing out Splatfest victories to any given team just because more people wanted that team to win. Raider Nation is huge, but should they be given a free win each weekend for that reason? No, they play the game, and if they want to win they have to earn it by out-competing their opponent. I realize it's not a perfect analogy, but the point is that, I feel at least, any victory must be earned. That's why I'm big on wins over popularity.

And Pirates vs. Ninjas isn't a very good example. Had they not raised the multiplier from 4x, the ninjas still would've lost that one. And isn't 4x supposed to be the ideal multiplier?

 

[Zombie Aladdin]

Raider Nation is huge, but should they be given a free win each weekend for that reason? No, they play the game, and if they want to win they have to earn it by out-competing their opponent. I realize it's not a perfect analogy, but the point is that, I feel at least, any victory must be earned. That's why I'm big on wins over popularity.

If we're using athletes as an example, it would be the equivalent of, when it comes time for the NFL Draft, every candidate being able to pick which team they want to be in, with no limit to how many people can be on a team. If, for whatever reason, seven of the top ten candidates decide the Seahawks are their ticket to victory, but no one else cares about them, the Seahawks will have an easier time that season and will likely beat teams that had an advantage over them prior because most of the best rookie talent is there.

If I were designing the skill metrics, I would have game keep aggregate data on several factors: shot accuracy, the amount of time you ride the tower, carry the rainmaker, how close to goal you get with it, the number of times you take the tower/RM to goal vs letting your teammates do it, your average coverage, the number of times you take damage without dying vs dying, how long you stay alive in between deaths, and numerous other things that correlate with a player's level of performance. It would use all that data to build a player skill and gameplay profile. Based on shot accuracy, K/Ds, and coverage the game can determine whether you are aggressive, defensive, or somewhere in between. Based on that, it will weigh different stats based on how they correlate with other players with a similar gameplay style. The computer would then perform a lot of complex calculations to create a 3D bell curve that represents your gameplay trends, and compare that bell curve to several other players to place you within a set range of player values that represents ranks or tiers.

Using Tatsunoko vs. Capcom as something that comes to mind (which keeps track of your playstyle based on a lot of stats), in addition to aggressive and defensive, there's also the evasive playstyle. (The game doesn't indicate it directly, but it classifies you as Fire, Ice or Lightning. Fire means you're aggressive, ice means you're defensive, and Lightning means you're evasive.)

Maybe the game can keep track of first strikes to determine that: Someone who often takes the first stike--that is, someone who will frequently shoot at an opponent who is not yet fighting back, or does a lot of ambushes, would be aggressive. Someone who mainly attacks only opponents who are already shooting back at them would be defensive. And someone who chooses to retreat without shooting back when shot at would be evasive.

 

[Award]

Are hardcore squads really that prevalent that they'd tip the balance of a Splatfest?

I have no idea what squads do since I'm not in one and don't touch that part of Squidboards or anything.
Any squader wanna give insight?

Squads, and specifically clans are genuine "hardcore" players. Moreso than Ranked Battles. I can't speak for general 4 player Splatoon squads, but the larger clan groups and such, it's not that they simply play Splatoon (or COD, or Halo, or Quake.) It's an actual league like regional amateur football/baseball/soccer leagues. I haven't seen what Splatoon clanning is like, but I was in a Quake clan waay back in the early days of clanning, back before a lot of the formalities of today were in place, so it was kind of the Wild West for us. While it's not professional and there's no pay, money, bonuses etc involved, it's very serious amateur groups. They generally have a roster of players, and will typically have scheduled mandatory and scheduled optional practices and/or strategy planning meetings. The tournament ladder is predetermined within the league (or just between clan/squad leaders.) and works like NCAA ladders usually of who plays who. Matches are scheduled events as with practices, and who will play in the match from the roster will be determined by player availability, possibly performance/role, etc.

Some are more casual groups of friends that know they'll lose and just do it for fun. Others are quite serious, you miss more than one mandatory practice, you're out of the group. You will not be late. Some even enforce performance standards (if your performance falls too much, you're out.) Like with the most serious of amatuer sports leagues some do see it as a genuine commitment and you WILL plan your life around the schedule you're committing to. And you're playing not to simply win TW matches but to secure the position of your clan/friends/ and their status in the tournament - they're counting on you.

So yeah, it's a whole different tier of seriousness, and these guys mostly choosing one team would certainly create a skew. You could consider them semi-pro players. In some games they ARE pro players (LoL, DotA, Starcraft, COD, etc has clans that go pro for real money via e-sports tournaments. Smash as well though it's not a team game so the organized clan thing doesn't really apply.)

I never went for the real hardcore stuff, the Quake Clan I was in back in the day was mostly a casual group of friends. We had a roster of I think 15-20 players, depending on game mode 4-6 would play at a time in actual matches, but practice sessions would be a modded game mode that could let everyone in and it was team v team. They were casual and not strict, I sucked quite badly but they let me play with them, though there were some mandatory practices. I still keep the clan tag (it's in my NNID ;)) though most of us lost contact long ago.

In Splatoon, you can squad for fun, just 4 friends, or you can go the clan route. The for fun squads wouldn't create too much skew. The clans certainly can. They, as individual players wouldn't be any worse than your typical S/S+, but what they have is a level of team awareness and cooperation that those who aren't used to group practice on specific roles would not be accustomed to. They can't coordinate like they do in real matches in random Splatfest, but they have a familiarity with a higher level of awareness and role utilization.

The Splatoon scene, which I'm not a part of, may or may not be more forgiving than the scenes in other games where the "PC 1337z" like to make everything a chest beating opportunity about how much they're teh h4rdc0rez. (queue the Dorito's and case of Mountain Dew.)

From what I can tell, this isn't the case. Also, you continue to point out Japan and Europe's Splatfests as if the ones in which one team has more popularity and wins actually matter in regard to choosing a win rate multiplier. Japan and Europe's Splatfests have their own separate issue that can't be alleviated by changing the multiplier. Why should North America's Splatfests not matter?

Keep in mind the multiplier is not region specific. It's part of the engine, and there are no separate regional rules, just separate regional text data and theme text/artwork/color values. They don't have different scoring systems by region, so if they changed it, it would be worldwide.
The need to add region specific scoring would imply there's something unique about the contest in a given region, but there really isn't. If you were a "serious" player looking for the most likely team to win on in the other regions, you'd simply pick the team that'll probably be more popular. It won't guarantee a win, but it makes it more likely. Here the inverse is true, but still, choosing Callie does NOT guarantee a win, an upset can happen at any time where Marie is least popular, or where the most popular wins. It's not set in stone, it's just a preferred outcome. Just the same as betting on a winning team in any game. Sometimes Seabiscuit steps on a rock, or Hank Aaron throws a ligament, and it's all over. Players play and try to pick a winning team. They may not care about themes and only care about winning. Or maybe they like the minigame of betting on the winning team. Or they like both themes and go with the one they think will win (Coasters v Waterslides....Hot Dogs v. Marshmallows....Burgers v Pizza....Pirates v Ninjas how can you even CHOOSE between these? It's like "which adorable kitten should make sausage from?" :)) Even I picked the winner in Burgers v Pizza because I had no affinity to one team or the other, I liked both. I had to go with Nice and Past on principal though, no contest. And how could you not pick Ninjas as a Nintendo fan (Although...Tetra...?) o_O

Ah, my mistake. The scores would reflect real wins as the players have to actually win the match for it to count for them. However, given the skill discrepancy, the scores would be weighted because A match between 4 Cs and 4 As will benefit the As. Are there C ranks who can outperform A ranks? Absolutely, but I suspect these people are the exception and not the rule. This system wouldn't have to factor in every rank, merely delineate between C>B and A>S. That would prevent the game from weighting S rank players who fall into the As after a losing streak, which would only leave people with alts or C Rank prodigies as outliers.

But then you're almost enforcing ranked play as a requirement for Splatfest. What about those of us who don't play a lot of ranked? Our scores would either count way over what they should or way under. If we're getting into using ranks for Splatfest balancing, then we have to talk adding in the ranked modes into Splatfest. And that would be a mess.

 

[Award]

If we're using athletes as an example, it would be the equivalent of, when it comes time for the NFL Draft, every candidate being able to pick which team they want to be in, with no limit to how many people can be on a team. If, for whatever reason, seven of the top ten candidates decide the Seahawks are their ticket to victory, but no one else cares about them, the Seahawks will have an easier time that season and will likely beat teams that had an advantage over them prior because most of the best rookie talent is there.



Using Tatsunoko vs. Capcom as something that comes to mind (which keeps track of your playstyle based on a lot of stats), in addition to aggressive and defensive, there's also the evasive playstyle. (The game doesn't indicate it directly, but it classifies you as Fire, Ice or Lightning. Fire means you're aggressive, ice means you're defensive, and Lightning means you're evasive.)

Maybe the game can keep track of first strikes to determine that: Someone who often takes the first stike--that is, someone who will frequently shoot at an opponent who is not yet fighting back, or does a lot of ambushes, would be aggressive. Someone who mainly attacks only opponents who are already shooting back at them would be defensive. And someone who chooses to retreat without shooting back when shot at would be evasive.

Yeah, you missed BZ and I having epic diatribes in a few threads on the ranked scoring and matchmaking systems. ;) You probably don't want us to revisit that here :p Bottom line is Splatoon's matchmaking is....not like Tatsunoko v. Capcom. Or Halo. It's better than flipping a coin. But not by much. I think we can all agree we'd love to have a system more like you describe. But we're not going to get it in this version of Splatoon. We get a new map today, with no mention of a major update, and only 1 week to go before they cut off all major updates short of tweaks & fixes. It does track killer/inker best as we can tell, but that's probably about it.

One problem with what you describe, though, (and is probably an issue with killer/inker too) is eliters & blasters. They're naturally awful at inking and built around killing, but that doesn't mean someone using them is actually a killer either. An eliter that doesn't get a shot at an opponent before they fight back is probably a splatted eliter, but it's not really an aggressive style by nature. if you choose one, you're inherently going for defensive/evasive. So weapon would have to factor in.